Tag: Autocrats Never Lose

Why MAGA Republicans Get So Upset About Gender ‘Pronouns’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The issue of “pronouns” is a sticky wicket for a number of reasons because it’s a prime example of the two sides talking past each other. MAGA Republicans get really, really upset about this issue and they are often ridiculed by people on the center-Left because they use context to explain what makes them mad. So, instead of saying what they mean, which is “I hate *gender* pronouns neologisms,” they just say “My pronouns are kick ass.” (Or whatever) Or they say The Bible doesn’t use pronouns and so forth.

I’m no expert, but I do come from a bedrock conservative family and so I have some sense of why this particular issue enrages MAGA Republicans so much. I think some of it is it’s an easy-to-understand wedge issue. The idea that there would be more than two genders is something so alien to the your typical conservative that it’s easy for dipshits within the MAGA Republican ranks to demagog it.

And, you have to admit that the center-Left doesn’t do itself any favors when it gets prickly about the proper use of gender pronouns. And that’s why MAGA Republicans love to wallow in their hatred of the concept because it’s something they know will easily “trigger” the libs that they crave to “own” so bad.

I have to mention the talented writer Brock Colyar of New York Magazine when I talk about this. I read his great piece about the use of pronouns….and yet I feel as though there was something that the reader was meant to read between the lines. He goes on at great length about how he knows the use of gender pronouns is alien to a lot of people and he has gone out of his way to be a “safe space” for such people to talk about their use.

He wraps it all up by saying maybe just call him by his name.

Ok, that’s good writing, but it dodges the issue at hand — the use of gender pronouns is controversial because it’s something of a shorthand for MAGA Republicans about how much they hate libs and why they want to own them so bad. The use of gender pronouns ties into the general “gay scare” the United States is going through and the battle over trans rights, etc, etc. So for him to just end any discussion of a subject that he’s well known for by simply saying, “maybe just call me by my name” sees….like a cop-out.

It seems like something you write when you want to avoid confronting your audience with the obvious conclusion of “Yeah, I use unconventional gender pronouns, either accept that or fuck off.”

I will be the first to admit that I’m rather envious of Brock Colyar for being young in NYC, something I will never, ever have the chance to be. And Brock Colyar is obviously an excellent writer. I just wish Brock Colyar had not given his piece such a trite ending. What he wrote about really fucking riles some people up and maybe he needed to address that a bit more directly. And, he did address that some in what he wrote — but I guess I was expecting a more direct, full throated defense of his use of non-traditional gender pronouns.

Anyway. Just had to get that off my chest. But the issue of gender pronouns is really a prism into the forces that are tearing the United States apart. The distain for the use of gender pronouns is a shorthand used by MAGA Republicans to easily distinugish between the “them” of libtards and “us” of “real America.”

The United States is careening towards a very, very dark future. Between now and spring 2025 we’re either going to have a civil war, turn into an autocracy or have something akin to a military junta. Then the last thing any of us will be worrying about is our gender pronouns.

Why Ron DeSantis is Sending Undocumented Immigrants to Blue States

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Without even checking, I can tell you that my Traditionalist relatives are probably overjoyed with Ron DeSantis’ dick move where he sent undocumented immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard. It’s simple to understand and the moment they realized what he was doing, they probably shouted for joy. The reason is the “idea” of doing such a dick move plays into their preconceived media narrative.

Ron DeSantis

It doesn’t matter what actually happens — the libs have been owned and they feel smug that liberal hypocrisy over the “border crisis” has, at last, been exposed. And if all else fails, they will willfully accept any lie that MAGA Republicans may happen to concoct about what happened.

And I would note that if you look closely at Ron DeSantis’ expression whenever he talks about what he did, he looks pretty much exactly like my Traditionalist relative whenever we get into a political debate. So, in their eyes he looks “strong” in the face of evil libtards who want everyone to turn gay. It doesn’t matter how real any of it is — that’s what they see.

I guess what I’m trying to say is — things are very dire for what’s left of American democracy. It’s interesting to me that I go out of my way to tell my Traditionalist relatives that they “just have to be patient” and they’re going to get everything they want politically — and that is STILL not enough to calm them down.

They have been so conditioned by the Right wing echo chamber to feel aggrieved for the slightly slight that they are pretty much totally disconnected from reality. Anything that doesn’t fit their media narrative is “bogus.” They believe what they believe and that’s that. So, in a sense, American politics is now dead and we’re all simply waiting to see if we have a civil war, turn into an autocracy or have some sort of military junta.

Now one thing that is darkly comical about all of this is my Traditionalist relatives — whom I love dearly — have told me that they have one red line: political violence. So as long as we peacefully become an autocracy, they won’t mind.

Then, of course, there is the real Red Line — the personal. I’m something of a kook and I’ve had the luxury of living in a Western democracy all my life where I can get drunk and shoot off at the mouth if I feel like it. And I have made it clear to my Traditionalist relatives that I absolutely refuse to shut the fuck up. So, in the end, if DeSantis becomes POTUS and we endup becoming a Russia clone because of that….they’re going to have to figure out how to get me out of an ICE camp.

That will be fun.

The great irony is, of course, that Trump still hasn’t gotten out of the way. It’s very possible that DeSantis could even get the nomination and Trump bolts to the Patriot Party and we have a three way clusterfuck in 2024. Again we’re past the Even Horizon for some seriously fucked up shit between now and spring 2025. If you have the means, begin to game out your escape plan.

Of JK Rowling & ‘Cancelation’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

While I’m aware that there is more to what makes JK Rowling “problematic” than just her status as a TERF, that specific issue is what I want to talk about. I want to address it because the debate over TERFs can grow so heated that it’s difficult to talk about it at all.

This is the definition of a TERF that I found.

a feminist who excludes the rights of transgender women from their advocacy of women’s rights. “they accused the protester of being a TERF and transphobic”

What is confounding about the issue of a TERF is you find a situation where conservatives side with TERFs — feminists — against people who are trans right advocates. This is a very sensitive, touchy situation for a number of reasons — especially when children are involved and that, of course, makes it red meat for MAGA Republicans who want to wallow in it as a wedge issue that will drive people into the arms of fascism.

The point is — a Leftist can be so aggressive in their hatred of TERFs and anyone who doesn’t agree with their general media narrative about trans gender rights that the thing we all need at the moment — for our politics to function so we can sort this situation out that way rather than through fascism — gets short circuited.

If we’re going to have a functioning democracy we have to be willing to have the marketplace of ideas where people who disagree are able to hash things out so some sense of the collective understanding of things can be determined. When you’re so beholden to a Leftist orthodoxy that you attack even people on your own side, you got a problem.

All of this plays into the MAGA Republican fascist agenda. It’s why the United States is going through an unpreceded “gay scare” long after we all thought some basic gay rights were established. A lot of Traditionalists honestly believe that the “woke cancel culture mob” is trying to “turn everyone gay.” They really honestly believe that.

I personally am indifferent to this particular battle. It’s difficult for me to come up with any opinion one way or another because would prefer this be settled through traditional democratic politics, rather than political violence of any sort.

I suppose the issue for me about Rowling is it’s too easy for Traditionalist to point to her as an example of someone being “canceled,” and, as such, that feeds into their overall believe that the woke cancel culture mob is going to come after THEM for not following the “woke agenda.”

I just wish there was some way to tell everyone to cool it so we can figure out what’s best for the country. But, alas, I fear this is yet another example of how we’re pass the event horizon for autocracy, civil war or a military junta at some point around 2025.

Twitter Liberals Can Sometimes Be Too Cute By Half

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I hate the MAGA Republican movement with a white hot rage equal to the center of the sun. It’s that rage that has generated the mental and emotional energy necessary to throw myself into writing what I hope to be a six novel project. (No one believes in me other than me, but, lulz. I’ll put a move on you.)

Anyway, the point of this post is, Twitter liberals love to point out the dumb misnomer that “anti-woke” MAGA Republicans say when they say shit like, “There are no pronouns in The Bible.”

We all know what they mean! And the people who are their intended audience know what they mean! This happens all the time on Twitter when Twitter liberals play the “you so dumb” gotcha game with MAGA Republicans who, within the context of their echo chamber, make perfect sense.

I only bring this up because it’s a sign that the two sides are talking past each other, that our politics has finally collapsed to the point that rather than trying to understand each other, we simply make fun of the difference in context. The differences between the two sides is now so extreme that we willfully ignore the obvious explanation for why someone says something that is obviously inaccurate– even to them.

But I think we’re too past the Event Horizon for there to be any understanding. The country is tearing itself apart and either we become and autocracy, have a coup that turns us into a military junta or we have a civil war. There is no middle ground and we’re completely fucked going forward. We’ve collectively given up and the only thing I don’t know is which horrible endgame we’re going through before things are settled again.

‘Something to Cry About’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There continues to be a false equivalency between the soft power of the “woke cancel culture mob” and the rise of MAGA Republicans. This happens, of course, because we are “both sidesing” ourselves into autocracy. We simply can not, will not address the rise of fascism in the United States because fascism is popular.

The idea that the “woke cancel culture mob” is just as bad as what MAGA Republicans want is going to be very quaint when MAGA Republicans start murdering people like me for political reasons en masse. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if we somehow manage to make it to the other side of history and have some sort of Second Reconstruction in the United States that one of the things we’re going to all be the most sheepish about is how much weight we gave to the “woke cancel culture mob.”

Now, let me be clear — there are definitely some illiberal elements to the center-Left and it really is easy to frame all our problems as a battle between the “woke cancel culture mob” that wants to “turn everyone gay” and MAGA Republicans. But, in the end, we have to also accept that the soft power of the woke cancel culture mob in no way compares to the inevitable political violence that will come about when MAGA Republicans either turn the United States into an autocracy or force us into civil war. (There is the third option, of course, of a military junta.)

And, yet, I suppose that such conflation between soft and hard power is inevitable. It goes with how modern American journalism feels absolutely compelled to be “objective” to the point that it’s complicit in the rise of violent fascism.

I believe that in the end, the worst of the woke cancel culture mob will simply burn off as a result of us taking one of the three options I mentioned above. It’s difficult to be worrying about your gender pronouns when things are suddenly far more existential.

Or, to put another way, when push comes to shove, history, as my father would say when I was a child acting up really will give us “something to cry about.”

My Hot Take On The ‘Border Crisis’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

When I talk to my Traditionalist relatives — whom I love dearly — it is clear that besides believing in an abstract manner that the “woke cancel culture mob” wants to “turn everyone gay,” the other issue at the forefront of their minds is the “border crisis.”

The “crisis” at the border is an intractable one of a number of reasons and, honestly, I don’t even know that much about it. But here’s a gauzy overview of what I do know and why I think the whole thing is, in a sense, a bunch of racist, bigoted MAGA Republican bullshit.

Ok, so the issue is, MAGA Republicans are obsessed with “securing the border.” And, yet, in large part because of racism, bigotry and Trump, they have staked out a position that is not only extreme but done in bad faith. It’s not like there is anything that Democrats could propose that would make MAGA Republicans happy at this point.

It’s in the vested interest of the Republican Party for there never to be any solution to the border crisis. And what makes this even worse is the problem at the border, in a sense, is the original sin of MAGA Republicans. The influx of people across the southern border touches on a whole host of pet grievances on the part of MAGA Republicans.

There is the issue of modern Americans refusing to do a lot of jobs to the point that there are jobs waiting for undocumented people once they get across the border. There is the issue of there being a white birth dearth to the point that angry white Christian men feel all wiggly and jiggly about their status in a browning of America. And THAT is connected to white educated women simply not being interested in making those sweet, sweet white babies that would help racist MAGA Republicans stay in the majority.

As such MAGA Republicans are operating in bad faith when it comes to the border crisis. They don’t want to solve the problem because they know it’s the path to autocracy and a white Christian ethno state. The border “crisis” simply isn’t as big a deal for Democrats and so this plays into MAGA Republican rage and believe that they can one day seize power and just never let it go.

As I keep saying — we’re fucking doomed. I just don’t see how we don’t endup either with a civil war, an autocracy or a military junta. Get out of the country if you have the means. Otherwise, figure out what you believe in, what you’re willing to suffer for in the real world.

It’s Inevitable That Ron DeSantis Will Be America’s First Autocrat — But For Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The “crisis at the border” is MAGA’s original sin. The fear of the browning of America — more so than anything else — is the thing that juices the MAGA Republican base. And the thing that Twitter liberals fail to realize is DeSantis’ stunt where he sends undocumented people to Blue areas of the country is pretty much a value free thing to do, at least from the point of view of the MAGA Republican base.

There is NO reaction on the part of Blues to DeSantis’ dickhead move with undocumented people that would cause him to stop. The country is now so divided that just the *idea* of him doing such a thing is enough to get the MAGA Republican base excited — no matter what the outcome. As such, DeSantis, much like Trump before him, now can bask in the glow of free earned media.

Remember, 20 years ago, DeSantis would have been just your typical ambitious Republican. But he’s studied Trump’s success and now, here we are. He’s going to be America’s first autocrat. He will, of course, bank to the center as necessary for the general in 2024, but once he’s actually in power…lulz. America’s democracy is so weak at the moment that he will make short work of what’s left of it and he’ll simply be president — or in power in some way — for the rest of his life.

It may be a Constitutional Convention or it could be that he is named Speaker after eight years of being POTUS. And remember, DeSantis is one of a dozen other would-be Republican autocrats who would do the very same thing given the opportunity.

Having said all that, we have to address the issue of the one person who stands in the way of DeSantis and his brass ring of being America’s first autocrat: Donald Trump. He isn’t going anywhere and even if DeSantis manages to become the Republican nominee, there is every reason to believe that Trump will simply go to the Patriot Party — taking his followers with him.

Of course, something I can’t predict might happen to Trump, but at the moment at least, that’s the conundrum that DeSantis finds himself in. His best bet is to put himself in the strongest political position possible so he forces Trump to pick him as his veep. Then DeSantis will be in a prime position to finish the job that Trump is too stupid and too lazy to do.

But there the issue of Trump, unto himself, potentially starting a civil war at some point between now and spring 2025. It’s highly unlikely that such a thing might happen — but the risk is definitely greater than zero. There are any number of scenarios where Trump either starts a civil war early to save his sorry ass or starts one later because Blue states refuse to bend a knee to his autocratic fascism.

The bigger picture is we’re fucking doomed. America isn’t even a democracy anymore, it’s an “anocracy.” We have three endgames before us: autocracy, civil war or military junta. That’s it. No middle ground. No more stable democracy. The two sides are simply too far apart and have stopped talking to each other and when they do talk to each other, they don’t listen.

If you have the means, get a passport and start figuring out where you’re fleeing to. You may never come back to a free America again.

My Hot Take On Dennis Prager

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The issue with Dennis Prager is he always frames whatever he’s talking about in such a fucking annoying manner that strokes the MAGA base while enraging people like me.

From what I see on Twitter about Prager, he’s just another one of those MAGA “thought leaders” who takes great pains to frame any discussion in a way that leans into the confirmation basis of your typical middle brow MAGA Republican. In a sense, he’s much like Joe Rogan in that respect.

Both men traffic in MAGA Republican outrage porn hidden behind a vague, conflated mentality of aggrievement that MAGA loves to wallow in. Their very argument is bad faith and frame in such a way that when your Traditionalist relative uses one of their talking points while you’re having Thanksgiving dinner it’s very difficult not to grow extremely angry.

And, what’s worse is, all of this bullshit is extremely corrosive. It’s why people in the same family can’t talk about politics anymore. When you have Prager or Rogan getting all bent out of shape about the stupidest shit that they claim is “woke” then there’s not much you can do about it.

If you do try to engage your MAGA Republican relative, then they say the facts you cite are “bogus” or they just get really mad an engage in debate nullification.

The main point is we’re fucked. That people like Dennis Prager get such traction is a very ominous sign. I don’t have any ready answer for you.

Gaming Out An American Military Junta in Late 2024, Early 2025

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I write a lot about the possibility of autocracy or civil war in late 2024, early 2025. And, yet, there is a third option that I’ve written about some, too: military junta.

How exactly what that happen? Well, it’s still too far to game out, but one possibility would be that Blue States begin the process of leaving the Union and the military finally steps in to kind of cool things down until, maybe, a Constitutional Convention can be called.

The other scenario is, of course, is the U.S. Military is forced to step in because, well, lulz, we have no idea who POTUS is — or, at least, can’t agree using political means who should be POTUS.

I think we have to give the idea of a military junta serious thought because history has shown us that that is often the route that modern democracies go when they finally fail. It happened with the French in the 1960s and it could happen here in a few years.

In my fevered imagination, I could see someone like James Mattis being named “acting POTUS” for a few months while we sort out exactly what we’re going to do about a National Divorce / secession crisis / certification crisis. The U.S. Military is the only remaining institution in America that would have the means to keep the country together if there was a severe political crisis.

And it would make sense, given how respected the U. S. Military is across the political spectrum for them to control the country through some sort of bi-partisan military junta made up of military and political leaders. A military junta might, in the end, be the only thing that stops either civil war or autocracy from happening.

But. And this is a big but — it could be that not even the American military would be able to avoid buckling should the time come. Generally, the officer corp still believes in democracy, while the enlisted are far more likely to support MAGA.

Which reminds me of the coup attempt that Turkey had a few years ago that ultimately did nothing more than allow their autocrat to consolidate power. So, again, I think in the end, America is just going to become an autocracy. Or, to make ourselves feel better, we’re going to pretend we’re a traditional Western democracy when, in fact, everyone and I mean EVERYONE will know that we’re simply another illiberal democracy like Hungary or Turkey.

The only question I have, of course, is — will I cross ICE and endup in a Trump branded concentration camp?

Twitter Liberals Keep Making The Liberal Progressive Case For A National Divorce

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I constantly see Blue Check Twitter liberals thinking out loud about things I’ve been writing about for some time now. What’s so darkly amusing is they pretty much make the liberal progressive case for a National Divorce without even realizing it. What they’re realizing, of course, is something that has been very clear to me for a long time — MAGA Republicans are ascendant and if there’s going to be a civil war it’s going to be because Blues start it, not Reds.

Now, we’re still to far out for me to know exactly how a Second American Civil War might actually play out. And I still don’t think we’re even going to have one. But as long as Trump continues to be a major American political figure, the risk of a modern day American civil war is very, very real.

It could be that by the time late 2024 rolls around, Blue States — probably starting with California — will simply refuse to “bend a knee” to the autocratic, fascist MAGA Republicans how have stolen the 2024 election and there will be a popular ground swell with Blues for Blue States to leave the Union and start their own country. (There is of course, the possibility that there might ultimately be some mission creep as such a possible war progresses and Blue goals would be to “liberate” Trumplandia as well.)

Of course, there is also the possibility that rather than seeing that they’re making the liberal progressive argument for a National Divorce that wealthy Twitter liberals will see these very same arguments as a reason to leave the fucking country.

And, at the moment, I think that’s what’s going to happen, no matter what.

MAGA Republicans steal the 2024 election and, rather than leading any sort of National Divorce, Twitter liberals will simply vote with their feet in pretty astonishing numbers. To the point that Fox News will stop being hysterical about scary brown people and their caravans and start to bitch and complain about a “brain drain” by “unpatriotic liberals.”

But what’s going on in Federal court about Trump stealing Top Secret documents in front a corrupt MAGA hack judge is all part of how the United States is careening towards a very, very dark future. We can’t keep punting this particular crisis down the road forever. Something’s gotta give. And the only question is — autocracy or civil war?